The Bluest Forever
by CatInFrance
Summary: Wilf can't seem to find the spirit of Christmas. He takes in a girl off the street, hoping charity will heal his wounds. But she's not all she seems to be and dragged back into the Doctor's world, Wilf finds help from Miss Martha Jones and the man he thought he'd never meet again. But the girl's identity has surprises in store for all of them, and the past won't be easy to confront
1. Chapter 1

**I don't own Doctor Who or anything of the wonderful things therein. All rights to where they belong.**

* * *

In the dark room, the walls could have been anywhere. A thousand times, he'd walked in it, and still, the size seemed to vary with the days. Today, the blackness pressed down on him, making the space shrink and the walls loom close enough for his breath to touch them. It weighed on him. Heavy, claustrophobic, he reached out in front of him to grasp at whatever lay in his path before he tripped on it. Hands hit the freezing control panel and he stopped, working out what switch to use. His clammy fingers stuck to the metal. He peeled them off censoriously.

It was like that, now. His head, constantly spinning. In the old days, he would have known the space of the room without groping for the walls. He would have been able to operate the system blind, he would have been able to twist it to his own use, but his memory failed him increasingly anymore. His lips twisted in disgust. A teal light burst around the edges of the room, revealing the secrets of the far corners. Another switch illuminated the control panel. And the third—his arm stopped above it, twitching.

Why? Not all that long ago, he'd do it….No, he'd delight in it. Seek it out. His arm started to shake with the effort of extending it out and he couldn't stop it. His muscles tensed and convulsed. Frustration roared up inside him and he slammed down the switch, nearly snapping it off. He jerked back his arm.

The teal swirled upward behind him in a column that extended like fire, bursting into the heavens, a whirl of colors and forms, the chaotic landscape, crackling, shifting, straining against its bonds, beyond the darkness above them, and the green-blue light that washed out the room never reached the ceiling. He wasn't sure there was one. Her limp form hung suspended in the middle and he spun to see. The hunger in his eyes devoured her every detail.

The reflex time, always a little slow at first, left her dangling like a corpse. It felt like ages, but then she finally gasped, she breathed, her head broke back, as if she was coming up for air from under an ocean's swell. The rest of her body didn't move much, arms and legs hanging uselessly. Her low shoulders and tilted face. Her eyes regained focus, then consciousness, and her mouth worked as if a scream might accidentally spill out. But she stayed silent and at last, glanced at him.

"We're alone," he said, looking upward, like he didn't mean to address her.

A long quiet followed, filled only by the dazzling, dancing lights about her. She frowned, a tight little moue he hadn't seen in ages. She caught his gaze and kept it, her air of authority making it hard to look away, even as wretched as she was.

"I recognized you," she replied in a whisper. "You've changed, but I know who you are." She clenched her teeth. She breathed in and out with short, struggling waves. He assured himself that her lungs were going. They would give out soon.

He ran a hand through his shaggy bleached hair and shrugged indifferently. "What of it?"

"I want to know why…. Why you came back and what you're doing and why you're…_here._ How dare you."

He rocked back and forth uncomfortably on the soles of his feet. Where was his suaveness, his eloquence? "Don't you know why they're doing this to you?"

She barked a harsh and bitter laugh that turned into a fit of coughing. Her features crinkled, afraid, but just for a moment. "Because I've been _deposed_. Don't patronize me."

"I didn't know it was you at first," he answered, turning back to the control panel, unable to meet her gaze. "You've changed too."

"So, what's the plan?"

Beneath his hands, a thousand tiny lights played out rhythms in greens, and reds, and yellows. Switches, knobs, buttons, all perfectly calibrated. He stared at them, past them. His pulses vibrated through him, strung out like fine wire. His muscles turned taut. Oh, the things he could do. The pain he could inflict on those who had put the numbers in his head. He counted under his breath.

"There is no plan. The plan's to wait to die," he paused. "Or…if you like, _I_ was the plan. Nobody ever told me, of course. All those years, all those years and I could've lived, but they put me in hell for their own desperation and look where it got us—" Rage ripped his throat. He screamed. His hands trembled, changed, blasted at the door, he could feel the heat, the burn, the sharpness of the light. The wall didn't show a scorch. They knew him too well for that. He composed himself, shaking his head, and turned back to her.

If his slow death shocked her, she didn't show it. Her tired face watched, endlessly patient, focused more on shuffling air through her lungs than on him. The effort. So much effort. He laughed, almost feeling like his old self again and continued, "But of course, that little _prince_ had to interfere. So now, they're _really_ desperate." He fiddled with one of the dials on the panel. "And you're nothing to them. Just a body."

"What are they going to...?"

He dropped his eyes, incapable of looking at her. "Something terrible," he muttered.

Footfalls outside of the room made him stop. He froze, the source of the sounds calculated on his face—his eyes picked out numbers from the air as if he could see them; the length of stride, the heaviness of the step, the pace. And he started to swear under his breath. He glanced at the panel, the _panels_ all around, auxiliary and secondary and primary all forming a giant ring around the column of blue fire.

"Do it," she whispered hoarsely, at last. His wild eyes snapped onto her and he shook his head. Was she asking him to….? The footsteps paused, and others joined them, shortening the distance to the door. They would find him there. They would know. "Do it," she repeated, like she was reading his thoughts. "They're going to kill me anyway."

So many buttons. Such perfect harmony. He held out his hands and the quivering stopped. Over his shoulder, he nodded at her. She pressed her lips together and closed her eyes. His hands slammed down onto the metal and he started to yanked at every knob, force every switch, shove every button, every lever, every piece of every machine. The lights flickered off. The system shuddered with a hiss, and a warning alarm started to shriek. He tore his way around the room, the noise pounding against his skull. The column of teal extinguished itself and then with a terrible creaking, the life-support shut down section by section. Impenetrable darkness descended, blacker than black; unreal blindness tricked his eyes. He halted, rigid. The locks on the door thudded; the tumblers shifted, pushed out of place. The door swung open.

She began to glow. Her fingertips shone. It spread across her palms. Gold. The universe. Sheer ephemera. The light slipped up with ease around the corner of her face, teasing out the edges of her hair.

He turned one last knob, gently, and the power suspending her vanished. She dropped in a grateful heap to the floor and he followed her to his knees, wrapping his arms around her slender frame, daring any one of them to come near him while she burned.

"Thank you," she breathed.

"Go find him," he answered.

Her eyes shut and her head lolled back. They yanked him away with tight grips on his arms; he let out a laugh, high-pitched and insane. Some plan, he thought.

Some plan, indeed.

* * *

_Her first breath of air was filled with smoke. The inside of her lungs burned—she had lungs!—and her first living reaction was to cough. Hacking racked her body. She writhed on the icy table. She smashed against the metal and pain surged through her bare skin._

"_Somebody get her air now!" came a command. She couldn't make sense of the words. Then a mask was shoved down over her mouth and nose. She took a deep, arching breath. She shuddered with the clean air. New sensations. She'd never breathed before, and now, the strange taste filled her mouth. Her skin felt cold and clammy on the metal._

_Lights danced before her eyes, shapes blurred around her, far too large. Her tongue wriggled, an impetuous fish. She could taste the white of her teeth, the pulse of blood in her body, hear the strange whistle of air in through her nostrils. A buzzing crawled through her ears, drowning out her thoughts, their words. Was this how they heard things, these people, through all this din? What ignorance. _

_And then the glaring light, and the pricks on her new skin. Beautiful new skin, clean of old scars, but so very tight, so very binding... and it hurt. Was she supposed to feel the lights making bumps on her arms crawl and shiver? Two men loomed into view, dark outlines in the shine. One of them brandished a cylinder of glinting silver. His mouth moved as he raised his eyebrows at the needle, running a hand through his wild blond-bleached hair. He tilted his head and looked down, distracted, but something old and reminiscent flashed across his eyes. Then he plunged the needle into her arm. And her vision went totally white._


	2. Chapter 2

It was sunlight, but Wilf hadn't remembered falling asleep. He groaned and stretched the world sideways in his vision. All he could really see, though, was the wooden back of the pew in front of him and the stone floor that extended underneath. His hand was tingling, waking up, and the tips of his nails brushed across the cold tile. Oh, the pew was uncomfortable. The wood, hard and unpadded. He frowned and sat up, rubbing his head, as a priest walked by. The man smiled at him, lips pressed together.

"You should have cushions on these things, eh?" he said feebly, with a weak little laugh. He could feel his back. And his legs. And his shoulders. He felt old.

"There is always room for guests here, though we may not offer… the most comfortable arrangements." The priest nodded to Wilf as he passed. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

"No, nah. Thanks, though." Wilf rubbed his grizzled face, his chin. Old. Ancient was more like it, like he'd aged twenty years in the past two or three. He didn't even know why he was here. It was three days before Christmas, and he'd spent the night in a church. Not even _a _ church, but _the _church. He groaned and yawned all at the same time. The priest disappeared. Wilf stood up, noncommittally deciding to go home at some point, even though Sylvia would have his head. He braced himself against the pew in front of his, stretching his legs. "Oh, not as young as I once was." He scrubbed his face with his hands, feeling every wrinkle in his skin. A sigh escaped his lips.

He had meant to get there earlier the night before, so that he could hear the children's choir and go home. But having been so late, and so tired… and something had told him, just a feeling, that he ought to stay…. All the same, he hated this place. His eyes caught the light of the giant stained glass window above the altar. The sun whispered down through the panes, color spilling in ephemeral splatters onto the stone floor, purples, reds, greens…and blue. The representation of a small police box stole his breath, as if Wilf hadn't been expecting to see it here.

_The Sainted Physician_, said the woman's voice in his mind.

_I thought it'd be cleaner_, said his memory.

The Doctor's sad, old eyes. Resigned. Excruciating.

And the church suddenly became too much. Wilf took a hobbled step forward, toward the window. He just wanted relief, sanctuary from the guilt, the pain, the unspoken apology lingering on his tongue, and all of the rest of him trembled with the thought that maybe… maybe this was all he had left, and….

The thick wooden doors burst open behind him like a shotgun blast. Wilf spun on his heel. A mess of ginger hair fled toward him, and for half a moment, he thought Donna had found him. Instead, the young, slight woman crashed into him, the contents of her shopping bag scattering everywhere. She flung herself behind him, clutching onto his coat sleeves. He opened his mouth, turning over his shoulder. "Please, you have to help me," she gasped. Panting, she peered over him, rising on barefooted tiptoe as gracefully as a ballerina. Wilf bent down to pick up an apple, raising an eyebrow.

"Wha…?" The words never made it out of his mouth. She held up the bag in front of herself defensively as a man in an apron stalked into the hall, shouting as he advanced between the pews.

"Alright, I've got you, now. Just you wait 'til the police get here, sweetheart. Just you wait. You think you can get away with shoplifting, m'dear? Then have I got a surprise for you." The shopkeeper paused and considered Wilf, weighing the situation on his eyebrows. "D'you know this girl, sir?"

Wilf turned, glancing again over his shoulder. The girl's eyes took in his face brightly with unbelievable trust. Why did she remind him of something? What was it? He brought his lips together and they fell apart again, without a word. "No, I…" he began to reply, but that didn't seem right. He started again, "Look here, I'm sure this can all just be sorted out peacefully."

Peeking out from behind him, she nodded earnestly. "Please, Wilf."

He met her gaze, and this time, he looked her over. A fat scarf snuggled around her neck and an ill-sized coat hung limply off her slim frame. She had no shoes, and her feet, stained winter-brown, rocked on the church floor, calloused and rough. Homeless without a doubt, he thought, recognizing her struggle to survive as if he could see it himself. The poor thing. She'd only been trying to feed herself in the dead of winter.

"See, now." Wilf started forward, pulling his wallet out of his pocket. "I'll settle the debt. How much did she take?" The words were out of his mouth before he'd even realized that he'd made the decision. The shopkeeper stared at him in astonishment, jaw hanging open. "Isn't Christmas a time for giving?" he justified. The idea felt more than good, it felt…_natural_.

The other man wiped his palms on his apron with a frown and finally nodded. "If this happens again, I'm holdin' you responsible for it, mate." Wilf inclined his head obligingly, and rotated, kneeling slowly to gather up the spilled contents of the shopping bag. A few apples, some cans of soup, a few bags of this-and-that, and most remarkably, a notebook and a pen. A starving girl stealing office supplies? Wilf couldn't puzzle that out.

The total was about everything he had in his wallet, but he handed over the money without argument, pressing the pounds solemnly into the shopkeeper's greasy hands. The girl watched in silence as the transaction proceeded, but she flinched as the man left and Wilf turned toward her.

"What were you thinking?" he said. "You can't just steal from people."

The girl trembled, ginger eyebrows lowering. Wilf's shoulders slumped as he shook his head. He didn't even know who she was, he didn't know what he was doing. This was mad. Sylvia was going to kill him. What was he thinking, giving all his money away in defense of a complete stranger when she would probably only do it again, and now he had the gall to stand around and chide her. He softened his voice taking his hand.

"What's your name, love?"

She bit her cheek, shrugging a little. Her forehead wrinkled desperately. "I don't…" She licked her lips. "I've lost it."

Wilf's eyebrows knitted together. "What's that mean?" She didn't respond. He pulled at his red cap and tried a different approach. "Why'd you take a notebook?"

Her face lit up again. She leaned around him and fished it out of the bag, followed by the pen. Settling down on a pew, she rested it against her knees and started to scribble. Wilf waited a few patient seconds before he looked over her shoulder. His mouth cut open so fast he thought that it might hit the ground with a thud.

The page was already half filled and her little hand clamped the pen deftly and delicately, belying the speed she wrote with. Wilf didn't know much about mathematics—it had never been his strong suit in school—but he could tell that this was calculus beyond anything he had ever heard of. Little figures and tiny symbols littered the paper, trailing in the wake of her furious scratching.

"My god," he breathed. "You're a genius."

She stopped and looked up, genuine surprise in her shiny eyes. They were light enough to almost seem silver. "Why, can't everyone do this?"

Wilf nearly laughed, even there, in that place, in the church he couldn't stand. "No, they can't. _I _can't." His mouth settled into a round state of shock. He'd barely woken up, and here was a conundrum, sitting smack in front of him.

"Oh," she tilted her head, pressing her lips together.

"Do…do you have a place to stay?" he ventured. "Somewhere to go? A homeless shelter maybe?"

"No." Agony, loss, incomprehensible destruction flickered over her expressions for a brief instant. Empathy stabbed his chest, her pain flooding his emptiness, that void that he'd never filled after the Doctor that Christmas. He hadn't been the same since. Even he knew that. And she looked just as lost as he was.

His mobile rang, snapping the silence that had drifted between them. He dug it out of his pocket, glimpsing the caller ID before answering. _Donna._

"Hello?"

His granddaughter's voice spilled out over the line. "Oh, _wizard_, you're alive. You better come home, Gramps. Mum's throwing a fit. She is going to go absolutely out of her mind if you don't get home soon. Where have you been?"

Wilf hesitated, then told most of the truth. "…At church."

"Church?" she sounded a little incredulous. "Well…alright." A long pause, then Donna asked quietly, "What's wrong, Gramps?"

"What do you mean?"

"You used to love this time of year. You made everyone so happy… and mortified Mum, every time you went out with those reindeer antlers. What happened to you?" The old Donna was in there, the most important woman in the universe, still trying to save the world.

"I'm…I'm fine, Donna," he forced out. Donna sighed without believing him. As an afterthought, he added on impulse, "Tell Sylv to set up the guest room, can you?"

She agreed, reminding him to come home soon, and hung up. The nameless girl stared up at him as he put away the phone. His own words rang back through his thoughts. _Isn't Christmas a time for giving?_

"Come on." He gestured to her and straightened up.

"Wilf…?"

"I can't very well let you freeze to death on the streets, can I? And besides, if I don't keep an eye on you, that shopkeeper will have both our heads, huh?"

Her eyes widened in a glimmer of silver. "You're helping me?" Wilf nodded. Her lips curved up gently, her curls bouncing around her face. She slipped her thin fingers into his hand. Shouldering her shopping bag, Wilf led her toward the church door.

He didn't even know why he was doing this. She was a complete stranger—lord, he didn't even know her name—but she felt familiar. And she needed him.

"And I have to make it up to them," he muttered to himself. He had to find himself again. He had to fill up the voids in his soul. He could find his old spirit again, for Christmas. Donna and Sylvia and Shaun. For their sakes.

Unbidden, unwanted, he thought of the Doctor, and his stomach plummeted. That blue box and that old, young man. Wilf could do it for him, too. _Please, let me make it up to you. Please, Doctor. I need this chance._


	3. Chapter 3

Looking both Wilf and the girl up and down as she helped smuggle them in through the backdoor, Donna frowned fiercely. "Mum is going to kill you," she hissed. "Who is this? Where'd you find her?"

"Has she gotten the guest room ready?" Wilf shifted through the doorway, fitting through perilously as the girl's grip on his hand clung tighter. She stared at Donna with big, round eyes as they ferried her through the hallway.

"Yes, but she hardly knew why. Kept asking, but I couldn't tell her anything. How was I to know you were bringing home a…" she glanced around and lowered her voice even further, "a homeless girl." She licked her lips and hurried to keep up with him, striding forward. "Besides, you haven't answered the question."

"She hasn't got anywhere else to go," Wilf replied defensively. "You should've seen her. She's just brilliant." Donna paused for half a step, faltering like she might half remembered something distant. It passed just as quickly and she rushed along. "And anyway, if we just clean her up before Sylv meets her, she'll never have to know—" They rounded a corner on the way to the bathroom.

"What? That you're bringing home strays?" Sylvia Noble planted her hands on her hips, standing in front of them imperiously. The girl drew back, taking Wilf's arm with her. "Dear lord, Dad, what's this? Is _she _what the guest room is for? I thought it was for Great-aunt Alice." She shot Donna a look with a sharp twitch of her eyebrow.

Wilf glanced at his granddaughter. She shrugged and rolled her eyes. "Well, _somebody_ had to make a good excuse!"

Wilf opened his mouth to start some sort of explanation—_what sort of explanation?_—but before he had a chance to say a word, his daughter launched into one of her infamous tirades. "Do you even know anything about her? Do you even know who she is? Could be anyone, you know, could rob us blind in the night, oh yes, mister, I've seen _all_ those documentaries, thank you very much. Who knows what she wants from us? Remember just last year, Regina met that _man_," she slid over the word with disdain, injecting as much contempt as she possibly could toward whoever it was, "and just like that, he'd taken everything but the kitchen sink!

"And, _you_, Dad, you were out all night! Anything could've happened to you! Have you seen the weather, you might've died in a wreck and we'd never have known. What a Christmas surprise that would've been, don't you think. And then Donna shows up," Donna glanced away, studying the ceiling, "tells me you've been in church all night? Whatever for, Dad? Why did you stay out all night? Were you really at church?" She shrugged, shaking her head.

"Sylv, it's okay, relax. I just lost track of time."

"Oh!" Her eyebrows rose and her blonde bob bounced indignantly. "Lost track of time. Well, of course. Why ever not? And then decided to pick up some girl on your way home? I hardly believe it. Didn't even bother to call to let us know where you were until this morning, and then all you say is 'prepare the guest room', and busy me away, as if I were your maid, not even leaving a reason why, and forcing my daughter to lie to me to cover for you and—"

"He was very sad," the girl interrupted suddenly.

Sylvia recoiled, lips pursing together, like she couldn't believe that anyone had spoken over her. Wilf wasn't sure anyone ever had. "What?" she demanded.

Coming out from around Wilf, the girl met Sylvia's gaze. "At the wedding. He was very sad."

Wilf froze and glanced down at her. Sylv's hands tightened at her sides, her eyes nearly bulging. Donna looked over at her, forehead wrinkling. "Sorry, what?" she asked.

"Nothing," spilled out of Sylvia's mouth in a rush at the same time Wilf added, "Nothing at all."

Suddenly, Sylvia smiled ingratiatingly and tilted her head. "Well, I suppose it's all the same," she said brightly. "How about you go help her clean up and see if we have anything that will fit her." She looked the girl up and down, taking in her ill-fitting and dirty clothes. Surprise didn't have time to form on Donna's face, still masked by confusion like whiplash all over her features. "No need to say anything else about it." She sent a meaningful glance in Wilf's direction, and another to the girl, for good measure. Shooing them away, she didn't turn back until Donna and the girl had disappeared into the bathroom.

"What did she mean by _that_?" Sylvia turned on Wilf, her eyes even wider than before. "She didn't….She couldn't possibly mean…" She flinched, stepping back. "She couldn't know about that. No one knows about that…that man." There was no need to say it; Wilf knew the tone of her voice that meant the Doctor.

He shook his head. "Of course not," he said. There was no way that the girl could know about the Doctor, much less the last time they'd seen him, all alone, _dying_, at Donna's wedding. "It was a funny coincidence, that's all, eh?" The words came out weakly. Dying, and it had been his fault. And yet that man, that incredible man, had handed them a winning lottery ticket as if he'd owed them everything. "Sylv….you have to understand, this girl, she's a genius—"

"But he said, that man said, that if she ever remembered him, she would burn and die—I will not let that happen to my daughter, you hear me? I don't care if she's a bloody Stephan Hawking in the making. Coincidence or not, I won't have her hurting my little girl." Sylvia gave Wilf a fierce, protective look. He sighed and hugged her.

"I promise it won't happen again." He smiled, reassuringly, and stepped back. She ran a hand through her hair and frowned. "I promise, it was nothing. Besides… it's almost Christmas. Can't we do something for her? She doesn't have anywhere else to go." He didn't realize the desperation in his own voice until Sylvia's face softened in concern. _Nowhere else to go_. He _did_ mean her. Not himself. He did.

"You're right. You're right, Dad. It's just a weird coincidence." She shook her head as if to clear it. "I'll go see if there are some extra clothes in the attic." She stepped around him, glancing behind her at his back with a worried crease of her mouth that she thought he didn't see. The sound of the shower coming on echoed from down the hall, and Donna emerged from the bathroom.

"Don't think that girl's had a shower in ages," she said. "She seemed surprised that it actually existed." She started to walk past him, then stopped, turning. Her hair swung around with her. Wilf rotated to better look at her. She opened her mouth and paused, thinking for moment, then smiled. "That was a good thing you did, Gramps. That's the kindest thing I think I've ever seen anyone do." Donna stood up on tiptoe and kissed his forehead.

His lips tugged up sadly. It was a good start, indeed.

"Merry Christmas."

"Happy Christmas, Gramps."

* * *

"What the hell is this?"

Martha Jones closed her eyes, biting her lip. She peered through one eye, ready for the worst, as she spun to face her husband. Why he was cleaning the desk in the first place, she'd never understand. It was a lost cause. Period. The wood was so covered by papers and mail and everything else that ended up there that they had probably melded to its surface. She flinched when she realized what he was holding.

The TARDIS blue envelope was littered with stamps. They were from all over the world, some places she'd never heard of that she only dared hope were from this planet. None of the years were right… if she remembered correctly the oldest dated around 1920, and the last from several years from now.

"I can explain," she managed carefully. Mickey raised an eyebrow and shook the letter.

"Oh yeah?"

"Of course." She stepped forward to gingerly pluck it from his hands, smoothing out the creases he'd made at the edges with her thumb. "It's…um… a letter." His lips twisted sideways, unsatisfied, and he scratched at the beard that was more stubble around his mouth. "From a friend. Who… collects antique stamps," she added lamely.

"And sends them through the mail? Who's that then?" Martha struggled for an answer and he shook his head, snatching the letter back. He dug his nail under the flap of the envelope. "I'll tell you what though; I think he does more than just collect them."

"Mickey, don't!" She jumped forward, grabbing his wrists as he tried to open it. She never had looked inside. She'd never been able to. She couldn't just do it now. "Please!"

He stopped, dark eyes taking her in. "What haven't you been telling me? What is this, Martha?"

She took a deep breath and looked away, unable to meet his gaze. "I don't exactly know."

"Is it from him? Is it from the Doctor?"

Martha bit her lip. "I think so."

Mickey didn't respond, staring into the distance. Too many emotions clouded his features to make sense of. Relief and anger and duty and the tiniest hint of fear jumbled all together. It was the mark of one of the Doctor's companions. His soldiers. They never really stopped fighting for him. If the letter was what she thought it was—a summons—then how could she have dared not answer it?

"We can't just base our whole lives around him. We've moved on," she replied sharply, arguing more with the voice in her head than the man standing in front of her. "All those things with the Doctor are in the past. It's time to put them where they belong. Behind us." She nodded firmly and slid the letter out of Mickey's fingers. Her exhale shook even so.

"If that's what you want." The response was too open-ended to make her comfortable. She glanced at Mickey and frowned, licking her lips. "Did you ever read it?"

"No." Life with the Doctor was incredible, like cascading whispers and stars and endless vistas, but it was hellish too, terrifying and heart-wrenching and awful. She didn't want that back. That's what she kept telling herself. Neither of them did. Right?

Martha folded the letter, still in the envelope, in half, and leaned around the desk to throw it in the trash. Her heart fell a little with it. She was never going to read it, why did it matter if she threw it away? Straightening, she sniffed, and Mickey wrapped his arms around her.

"We have moved on. Haven't we?" she asked, almost muffled by his shirt.

"Of course we have," he answered. But somehow, it didn't bring her ease. After all, she wondered, cold with the thought, could you ever really move on from the Doctor?


End file.
